More than an hour after Denver thumped Carolina 24-10 to win Super Bowl 50, the Panthers’ all-pro cornerback Josh Norman sat disconsolately at his news-conference podium, beneath the stands of Levi’s Stadium.

About 40 minutes before, when that morgue of a Panthers locker room first was opened to the press, Norman had sat on a stool in front of his locker -- pads and jersey off, game pants and soaked T-shirt still on, legs apart, head hung, staring motionless at the floor.

More than five minutes later, Norman still hadn’t budged: the quintessence of total devastation.

Norman was among the last Panthers players to will himself off his stool, into the showers and into street clothes.

So it was, about a half hour after that, that Norman was the last of the Panthers players called to meet the press to make it to his post-game podium.

It was an odd, even unfair, setup. Only a thin partition separated the two teams’ podiums in a large hall, just down the hallway from the locker rooms. From the Panthers’ side, you could hear the amplified voices of Broncos players on the other, still talking loudly and jubilantly about their statement victory in the Super Bowl’s golden-anniversary game.

A moment after Norman achingly sat down at his podium chair, he looked up and, to his right, saw victorious, smiling Peyton Manning on a huge widescreen TV hanging on the Panthers’ side of the partition. I snapped a couple photos of it.

The 39-year-old Broncos quarterback was still taking questions, still cracking wise, still having fun -- not in any rub-it-in fashion, for he’s far too classy to do that, knowing one of his vanquished competitors was watching and hearing him, live, from the loser’s-side podium.

Norman sighed heavily, and dropped his head -- and for more than 30 seconds couldn’t squeeze out word-one to answer his first question. This, from one of the NFL’s jawingest defenders, who can yap and taunt with the best of ’em.

That Josh Norman was now undetectable.

This emotionally crushed incarnation gamely tried to answer a handful of questions, his pain audible with every softly spoken reply.

Every minute or so he’d lift his head up, and there would be Manning, still on that TV screen, still smiling, still taking questions.

Perhaps the deepest pain for Norman is that he had nearly intercepted Manning twice -- on both occasions using his uncommon breaking speed and surprisingly long-stretching ability to get the tips of his fingers on the ball. But only his fingertips.

A couple more inches, both times, and he may have had two interceptions that steered the game his team’s way, much as Von Miller’s historic strip-sacks of Cam Newton had for Denver.

So now, as Norman half-heard questions under the din of Manning’s over-amplified answers, he’d look up and spot Manning again on that TV.

Then Norman, again, would instantly drop his head, close his eyes and sigh -- as if that might wipe out the cruel visual reminder that the thrill of victory nestled on the other side of that partition, the agony of defeat on his.

“I’m not going to lie and say this doesn’t hurt, because it does,” Norman said. “It’s going to be with me for a while, but I know I'll be back in this game. This feeling hurts, it just really does, but we just want to give thanks to God for allowing us to be here.”

This was no Newton type of sulk or pout. It was an honest attempt to fulfill his commitment amid pure-grade devastation.

“I’m having a hard time sitting here,” Norman said. “I’m going to be straight-up honest, I didn’t even want to talk to you guys.”

Norman gave full credit to the Broncos, saying they earned the victory, and are a great team.

But he suggested the Panthers beat themselves nearly as much as the Broncos did.

“I mean, we had our opportunities. We had our chances, and the other team sure didn’t make it easy for us. Gosh, those guys. Man. It’s just hard playing two teams, it really is.”

On the field afterward, as the golden confetti flew, Norman approached Manning and offered congratulations.

Asked what he told the likely-to-be-retiring 39-year-old, Norman said, “He’s one of the G.O.A.T.s (greatest of all time), man. He’ll go down as one of the best at everything.

“I’m just happy to be in the game with him, to go up against him. This was probably his last hoorah. We were just trying to spoil it, and we just came up on the (short) end of the stick, but much respect to him and his future endeavours.”

By that point, the big TV screen up to the right had faded to black. Manning was done talking.

So, too, now was Norman.

Again, he willed himself out of his chair. And left.

TROUBLES BEHIND VON MILLER

Apparently, the troubles are all behind Von Miller, MVP of Super Bowl 50.

You might recall the NFL suspended him for the first six games of 2014, allegedly for attempting to cheat a drug test. He also had run-ins with the law for failing to deal with a wave of traffic violations, including speeding and driving without a licence.

Two years ago he was a mess off the field, basically.

To hear teammates and coaches talk about him now, you’d never get that impression.

“I’ve known Von since he was a very young man at Texas A&M,” Broncos head coach Gary Kubiak said Monday morning, at Miller’s MVP news conference. “I’m so proud of his path and how he’s got to where he’s at. The thing that people don’t know … is the work he put in to get there.

“Von did not miss a football practice this year. Unless I sat him down Von during training camp to take a rest day, he did not miss a practice … He loves to play. There are a lot of talent football players out there, but when you find those guys that just want to play, he’s become a mentor to a lot of young players on our football team. They look up to him.”

The morning after his two game-changing strip-sacks of Carolina QB Cam Newton, Miller hinted at how he has grown, without mention of those troubling two-year-old incidents.

“Coach Kubiak always says 90 percent of life is fair, and the other 10 percent you’ve got just run with it,” the 26-year-old said. “And I rode the 10 percent, stayed consistent and here we are today.”

More than an hour after Denver thumped Carolina 24-10 to win Super Bowl 50, the Panthers’ all-pro cornerback Josh Norman sat disconsolately at his news-conference podium, beneath the stands of Levi’s Stadium.

About 40 minutes before, when that morgue of a Panthers locker room first was opened to the press, Norman had sat on a stool in front of his locker -- pads and jersey off, game pants and soaked T-shirt still on, legs apart, head hung, staring motionless at the floor.

More than five minutes later, Norman still hadn’t budged: the quintessence of total devastation.

Norman was among the last Panthers players to will himself off his stool, into the showers and into street clothes.

So it was, about a half hour after that, that Norman was the last of the Panthers players called to meet the press to make it to his post-game podium.